10 Great Marketing Tips to Drive your Business Further
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As the business world gets more and more competitive you can gain a huge advantage over your competition if you get your marketing right. Whilst many are reluctant to admit it, customers are the core to every business, and it is marketing that drives new customers to your business and reminds old customers of who you are, what you do and why you are so good at it. For these reasons you should take your marketing seriously, and to help you on your way here are 10 great marketing tips for driving your business further.
Identify who your customers are.
You need to know your target market. Unless you know exactly who they are it makes it very difficult to communicate to them. Who uses your business now? Who would you like to use your business into the future?
Know what your customers want.
Understanding your customers will not only help you sell to them, it will also help you attract the right customers into your business in the first place. What do you know about your customers? Are they interested in price or quality? Are they interested in quality at a low price? Are they local? How do they prefer to find you? How do they prefer to buy from you? What payment terms are attractive to them? And the list goes on. As you can see, the more you know about your customers and future customers the more you can tailor your marketing messages to their wishes and desires.
Listen to your customers before you do the talking.
You have two ears and one mouth and that's for a reason. The more you listen, really listen, to your customers the better you will be able to tailor your marketing communications to them. Not only should you listen for what they want, you should also listen to the feedback that they have about your current levels of service. The best business ideas often come from your customers. They will also tell you a lot of information about your competitors, making it easier for you to create a marketing campaign that blows your competition away.
Respect your customers.
Many businesses (especially large corporations) make the mistake of SHOUTING at their customers with marketing that either isn't tailored to the customers needs or treats them as stupid. In today's age people no longer fall for gimmicks or other marketing tricks that prey on their stupidity. When designing a marketing campaign its important that you treat your customers with dignity and communicate to them a message demonstrates respect. In return they will respect your company.
Identify groups of customers with similar unmet needs.
You can have great success by finding a niche market for your business. Getting to know your customers and truly understanding their needs can often help you uncover a niche market that fulfils an unmet need. This gives you access to a new market which may lead to lower marketing costs, viral advertising through word of mouth and publicity, and many customers that are happy that you have been able to solve their unique needs.
Tell the truth about the true strengths and weaknesses of your business.
Before you start any marketing campaigns you should do a thorough SWOT Analysis of your business as well as a Competitor Analysis. These tools help you understand your business even more and help you design marketing communications that play on your strengths, highlight your competitors weaknesses, and overcome your own weaknesses. If instead, you market your business in a way that purports that you can do something that you cannot then you will instantly lose all credibility. A marketing campaign without credibility is a waste of money as it will not generate new customers and it will lose the opportunity for word or mouth and repeat customers moving forward into the future.
Strengthen your businesses weaknesses.
After completing your businesses SWOT Analysis its important that you immediately start planning on how to address your businesses weaknesses. This protects you from competitors exploiting your weaknesses through their own marketing. Also, it gives you a chance to turn your weaknesses into your strengths and market those new strengths.
Listen to what the market is telling you.
Keep your ear close to the ground and listen to your market as a whole. By understanding all elements of your market including customers, competitors, suppliers, financiers, etc you will be able to strategically position your business to dominate your market. The key to strategic marketing is understanding your market, understanding all aspects of the playing field that you are playing on, and taking advantage of the opportunities as they arise.
Seriously, you don't need to pay for market research.
Paying for market research should be a last resort in all cases. Market research is expensive and can use up valuable marketing dollars that could be better spent on your actual advertising. You should exhaust all possible avenues of market data before dedicating part your marketing budget to market research. Such free market research sources include your own customers, customer data such as sales data, free market data like that from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, information from your suppliers, etc.
Celebrate Success and Reward those that help you.
Show your appreciation to those that help you develop a successful marketing campaign. In following the 9 marketing tips listed above you will enlist the help of your staff, business partners, customers, suppliers, friends and more. Do not forget to thank them all for their valuable contributions to the success of your marketing campaign.
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